On Chanukah we light the candles - מדליקים את הנרות madlikim et ha nerot . The root of madlik מדליק - is dalak דלק - "burn, kindle...

The word tag תג has some new popular usages: tag mechir תג מחיר - the " price tag " reprisal attacks carried out by extremists i...

In our discussion of the word shelet שלט , we said that Targum Yonatan on Divrei Hayamim translated שלטים as "shields". The word ...

Both before and after Gilad Shalit's release, we've seen many signs related to the campaign. His surname Shalit שליט means ...

One of the strange sounding words from Sukkot is koshiklach קוישיקלך (or sometimes spelled koishelach קוישלך). It refers to the woven hold...

On Yom Kippur we read about the service in the Temple that was performed on that holy day. Part of the service involved sending away a goat,...

In the previous post on teruah , we mentioned that while teruah refers to the short blasts (of the trumpet or shofar) and tekiah תקיעה ref...

Rosh Hashana is coming up this week, and I thought I'd look at some of the words associated with the shofar sounds heard on that day. S...

In my previous post on the word " bar " בר, I mentioned that there was one more meaning I hadn't discussed. That, of course, ...

In my post about bar mitzva , I wrote bar בר means "son" (primarily in Aramaic, but also in Hebrew, see Mishlei 31:2) The questi...

As you may have noticed , I have not written a post in several weeks (actually a few months). While life always has other distractions (like...

When I was in eighth grade, I asked a rabbi a question. If we believe in only one God, why is God’s name in Hebrew a plural? I know I was th...

The Shabbat before Pesach is known as Shabbat Hagadol שבת הגדול - "The Great Sabbath". While the phrase " shabbat hagadol ...

In the post on simcha , we saw that there is a connection in Hebrew and other Semitic languages between words meaning light and sprouting, b...

We're all familiar with the word simcha שמחה - "joy" (and hopefully with the concept as well!). This noun is based on the ...

We previously discussed blo בלו , a tax first mentioned in the book of Ezra. Blo is mentioned together with two other taxes that are not us...

Lately there has been a lot of news about the proposed increase (and subsequent decrease) in Israel's excise tax on gasoline. Until I ...

We previously discussed the Hebrew word for fruit - p'ri פרי . Now lets look at a particular fruit - eshkolit אשכולית - "grapefru...

In honor of Tu B'Shvat, the Academy of the Hebrew Language posted a page about the Hebrew word for fruit: פרי - p'ri ( I prefer th...

Reader Zvi writes: With the impending partition of Sudan in the news lately, it would be interesting if you could address the multiple use...